winter storm

That's my dye studio out there! Even though we are out of practice for getting snowed in, we did a good job yesterday.

A big pot of beef stew got made, Jim went out and bought a couple of bags of sand to throw around on the walkways and I went out with my friend Janice to socialize, make plans, see a film and generally enjoy the day before the storm hit.

Now we'll spend the day looking out the window as all this gets worse. They are promising a day's worth of icy rain and freezing temperatures to continue - let's hope that the power doesn't go out as the trees start breaking down.

on the wall

I finally painted out that ghastly yellow I put around "Lavenderia" .Now I can come in here without getting aggravated.  It's been too cold to spend much time in the studio so I painted at the kitchen table this morning, toasty with stew cooking and the oven going.

Now I'm going to brave the cold outside and get out a bit before the snowstorm they are predicting for the area.

more studio archaelogy

More tiny treasures uncovered while I think about what and if, is next for me as far as the cloth goes. A little rummaging in the archives revealed that I have been making these little hand stitched pieces for a long time -  before anyone was taking any kind of notice or paying slow stitching any special attention. It was what you did when there was no sewing machine and had the time to do it.

I know I took up the practice because I was away from home for ten or more hours at a time, working at a job that was mostly "watch and wait" where nothing much ever happened.
 My grandma always said "Idle hands are the devil's playground". When I was little I always wondered where this damned playground was. On this job the saying was never more true -with a few bored keystrokes I could have disrupted telecommunications for everyone east of the Mississippi. Best I had something else to occupy me in the idle hours rather than any self-directed on the job training.


This is "Small Comfort" from early 2005. This was just one of a  whole long series of pieces I called "Rothko's Puppies"

Ah spun gold! My magpie brain is so dazzled by a little bit of sparkle. This is the bottom side of one of the cusspots that I dyed and painted last summer.




I uncovered the whole basket of them in the studio the other day. Unfortunately most of them were more like bottles with the necks too small to stuff with scraps. A few were perfect little vessels.

good starts

I picked up the thread with this one last night and carried out my intention to make changes to using the Shiva oil sticks A. sent me some time ago.

I like the very slow, controlled results from using very little paint on a dry stiff brush, sneaking up on shapes and creating depth and definition. Must take care to go slowly and not screw this one up. One false move with this stuff and you are stuck with a mess.

You would laugh to see me back my car out of what can be sometimes tight parking in our driveway. Think about the Queen Mary pulling away from her berth.